Amazon tossed Sargent out of its HQ

One day after Apple launched the iPad in 2010, Sargent went to Seattle to meet with Grandinetti. The meeting was extremely tense.

According to Grandinetti's testimony, Sargent told him Macmillan wanted to change the terms of its contract with Amazon. Instead of the wholesale model, in which Amazon set the prices for e-books, Macmillan wanted to decide the prices itself in agency model -- which is what Apple had introduced.

Grandinetti informed Sargent that he considered the "ultimatum" to be "unpalatable," and he promptly escorted Sargent out of Amazon HQ. (Sargent described it as getting his "ass kicked.")

Amazon removed all Macmillan titles from its physical book and e-book catalog the next day.

Eventually Grandinetti "capitulated," he said, and signed agency contracts with all five major publishers -- including Macmillan.